[Congressional Record Volume 140, Number 47 (Tuesday, April 26, 1994)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Printing Office [www.gpo.gov]


[Congressional Record: April 26, 1994]
From the Congressional Record Online via GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov]

 
                          CONGRESSIONAL REFORM

                                 ______


                        HON. WILLIAM (BILL) CLAY

                              of missouri

                    in the house of representatives

                        Tuesday, April 26, 1994

  Mr. CLAY. Mr. Speaker, I am inserting in the Record views that I have 
submitted to the Subcommittee on Rules of the House regarding the 
recommendations of the Joint Committee on the Organization of Congress. 
I commend them to the attention of my colleagues.
       Dear Chairman Beilenson: I am writing to express my views 
     regarding the recommendations of the Joint Committee on the 
     Organization of Congress. While I agree with many of the 
     Joint Committee's recommendations, I believe other 
     recommendations of the Joint Committee are ill considered 
     and, if enacted, would be detrimental to the operation of the 
     House of Representatives.
       The most egregious of the Joint Committee's recommendations 
     are the proposed changes in the referral of legislation, and 
     the maximum number of committee assignments that Members may 
     take and the recommendation that the Committee on Rules 
     consider a resolution to eliminate any standing committee 
     whose membership falls below 50% of its membership at the end 
     of the 103d Congress. Taken together, these recommendations 
     are an intentional, albeit indirect, attempt to eliminate 
     several existing standing committees. I strongly feel such a 
     consequence would be detrimental to the operation of the 
     House, generally, and would be especially harmful to Members 
     of the Congressional Black Caucus and the constituents we 
     represent.
       First, the effect of limiting committee assignments, 
     without also limiting committee sizes, will be that some 
     committee's will attract too many Members to afford Members 
     sufficient opportunity to exercise any real influence within 
     those committees. Junior and minority Members would be 
     particularly disadvantaged as a result. In addition, such 
     large committees are always unwieldy and are often 
     inefficient or ineffective in their operation. The presence 
     of too many Members not only limits the input of individual 
     Members in the legislative process, but detracts from the 
     ability of the Members to give detailed and considered 
     reflection to the subjects before them.
       As an illustration, on several occasions the Chairman and 
     ranking minority Member of the Education and Labor Committee 
     have worked out informal agreements limiting opening 
     statements and the number of questions Members may ask during 
     committee hearings. The more important the subject of the 
     hearing or the witnesses before the committee, the more 
     essential such informal agreements become. There are 42 
     Members on the Education and Labor Committee. Even if each 
     Member adheres to the five-minute rule, it requires three-
     and-a-half hours simply to get through opening statements. 
     Each round of questioning requires an additional three-and-a-
     half hours. The alternative to an informal agreement 
     effectively limiting participation of Members in the hearing 
     process is to require Cabinet officers and others to waste 
     the better part of a day before they can even begin 
     presenting their statements. While essential, such agreements 
     substantially limit the quality and amount of information the 
     hearing produces and significantly limit the ability of 
     Members to represent the views of their constituents.
       The limitation on committee assignments proposed by the 
     Joint Committee, in the absence of any limitations on 
     committee size, inevitably will discourage Members from 
     taking assignments on so called minor committees, such as the 
     Post Office and Civil Service Committee. Such a consequence 
     does not reflect on the importance of the jurisdiction of the 
     Committee on Post Office and Civil Service or the need for 
     Congress to give considered deliberation to the policies 
     it establishes for the Federal employee workforce and the 
     United States Postal Service. As Vice President Gore's 
     National Performance Review highlights, effective and 
     efficient implementation of every policy and program the 
     Congress enacts is dependent upon the extent to which the 
     personnel needs of the Federal Government are identified 
     and addressed. Nationwide, however, there are fewer than 
     3,000,000 Federal and postal employees. In all but a 
     limited number of congressional districts, the direct 
     impact of the policies developed by the Post Office and 
     Civil Service Committee is minimal.
       By contrast, the Federal Government provides less than 8% 
     of the dollars spent on public elementary and secondary 
     schools. Notwithstanding the fact that education policy is 
     still primarily established at the State and local level, the 
     relatively small amount of Federal dollars will, 
     nevertheless, directly impact the country. Consequently, for 
     most Members, the relative value within their districts of an 
     assignment on the Education and Labor Committee versus the 
     Committee on Post Office and Civil Service is clear. Though 
     the work of the Post Office and Civil Service Committee is no 
     less essential, the apparent value to constituents, and 
     therefore the political rewards, of an assignment to the 
     Education and Labor Committee are substantially greater.
       I am not opposed to limiting to two the number of 
     committees on which a Member may serve if, in the wisdom of a 
     majority of the House, it is determined that such a 
     limitation would enhance efficiency. (It should be noted, 
     however, that the House has done relatively well in limiting 
     committee assignments. This is mainly a Senate problem.) 
     However, I am strongly opposed to limiting assignments if the 
     sizes of the committees are not adjusted to enable all 
     standing committees to be assigned a sufficient number of 
     Members.
       Assuming current committees sizes and assuming further that 
     those Democrats currently serving on the exclusive committees 
     retain those assignments are not permitted to take additional 
     assignments, when the remaining Democratic Members are 
     multiplied by two (the proposed limit on committees 
     assignments), approximately 96 positions on the non-exclusive 
     committees will be left vacant. Unless a rule limiting 
     committee size is adopted, it will be impossible to fill 
     those 96 vacancies and the Rules Committee necessarily will 
     have to consider a resolution eliminating certain standing 
     committees. (Though it is unclear from the Joint Committee 
     report, I am assuming that Members serving on exclusive 
     committees will be prohibited from serving on other 
     committees. Permitting Members of the Rules Committee, for 
     example, to take an additional assignment, does not, in my 
     view, eliminate the need to restrict committee sizes and 
     raises a host of additional concerns as well.)
       Among the committees that I perceive to be at risk are the 
     Committee on Small Business, the Committee on the District of 
     Columbia, the Committee on Post Office and Civil Service, the 
     Committee on the Judiciary, and the Committee on Government 
     Operations. These committees are particularly important to 
     Members of the Congressional Black Caucus and the 
     constituents we represent.
       While blacks constitute 15 percent of the Democratic 
     Members of the House, only three Members of the Caucus hold 
     full committee chairs, only a single Member of the Caucus 
     holds an appointed position within the party leadership, and 
     no Member of the Caucus holds an elected position within the 
     party leadership. In my view, failing to place a limit on 
     committee size is tantamount to recommending that the 
     jurisdictions of the Committee on Post Office and Civil 
     Service and the Committee on Government Operations be 
     combined. Both committees are likely to be chaired by 
     representatives of groups who historically have been absent 
     from leadership positions in the House. Not only would the 
     combining of those committees severely diminish the 
     effectiveness and ability of each of those committees to 
     fulfill their jurisdictional responsibilities, but it would 
     produce an unacceptable diminution in the influence women and 
     blacks are able to exert in Congress.
       The larger membership of the House of Representatives 
     automatically confers certain advantages and disadvantages as 
     compared to the Senate. Simply because of the greater number 
     of Members, as a general matter, an individual member of the 
     House will not exercise the same degree of influence on 
     legislation that an individual Senator will. However, because 
     of its greater size, House Members have the luxury of being 
     able to specialize to a greater degree than our colleagues in 
     the Senate. The means by which the House encourages and 
     achieves this specialization is through its committee 
     structure. To further diminish the number of committees in 
     the House is to surrender the singular advantage that the 
     House possesses. The consequence is to diminish the quality 
     of consideration that Congress, as a whole, is able to give 
     to legislation.
       The Joint Committee has recommended that the Speaker 
     designate a ``primary'' committee of jurisdiction when a 
     matter is jointly referred and impose time and subject matter 
     restrictions on the other committees of referral after the 
     primary committee reports the matter. Considered in 
     conjunction with the proposal to limit committee assignments, 
     the recommendation further encourages Members to seek 
     assignment to major committees and avoid minor committees.
       Major committees, because of their broader jurisdiction, 
     are more likely to be designated as primary committees. For 
     two different reasons, the autonomy of those committees more 
     likely to receive ``secondary'' referrals may be severely 
     compromised. First, the secondary committees lose discretion 
     to establish their own agendas. In most instances, the 
     primary committee will establish the schedule for the 
     consideration of legislation that has been jointly referred. 
     There are only two means by which the secondary committee can 
     seek to protect its autonomy over its legislative agenda. It 
     may forego consideration of jointly referred legislation, 
     thereby forfeiting its jurisdictional authority; or it may 
     seek to control its agenda by reporting the legislation 
     before the primary committee has acted on it. While the 
     second option may provide the secondary committee greater 
     flexibility in determining when legislation pending before it 
     will be considered, it may also effectively require the 
     secondary committee to postpone consideration of other 
     more important or urgent legislation.
       Even more problematic is the fact that the designation of 
     primary committees and time-limited referrals to secondary 
     committees may effectively eliminate the ability of secondary 
     committees to exercise authority over matters within their 
     jurisdiction. Under current House procedures, when a 
     committee decides not to report legislation, the sponsor of 
     that legislation has very limited options by which he or she 
     may seek to overcome the determination of the committee. The 
     Member may seek support for a discharge petition or the 
     Member may seek to persuade the Senate to attach the proposal 
     to legislation it is considering. The recommendation of the 
     Joint Committee provides Members with a third, potentially 
     more effective, means by which the consideration of the 
     committee of jurisdiction may be circumvented. By placing the 
     proposal in a vehicle within the ``primary'' jurisdiction of 
     another committee, the determination of whether the proposal 
     will be considered by the full House and in what context is 
     effectively transferred from the secondary committee, which 
     possesses the expertise on the subject matter of the 
     proposal, to the primary committee.
       Notwithstanding the above comments, I fully support that 
     part of the Joint Committee's recommendation directing the 
     Speaker, in the case of joint referrals, to specify the 
     responsibilities of each committee and impose subject matter 
     restrictions on committees. I concur in the view of the Joint 
     Committee that the adoption of this recommendation would 
     serve to minimize duplication, increase accountability, and 
     deter committees from encroaching on the jurisdiction of 
     other committees.
       There are two additional recommendations of the Joint 
     Committee that in my view will adversely impact on committee 
     operations. The Joint Committee has proposed that each 
     standing committee be required to prepare an oversight agenda 
     at the beginning of each Congress and file a report at the 
     conclusion of that Congress on how its agenda was fulfilled. 
     The Joint Committee further proposes that the initial report, 
     to be filed by March 1 of each new Congress, be filed with 
     the Committee on House Administration for use during the 
     committee funding process. Essentially, this proposal 
     requires a committee to develop an oversight agenda, at the 
     beginning of the Congress, well before the committee has had 
     the opportunity to determine what the most important issues 
     pending before it may be and then proposes that the committee 
     be held accountable for achieving an agenda that, at best, 
     has been prematurely established.
       It has been my practice to develop the committee's 
     oversight agenda in consultation with the ranking minority 
     Member, the subcommittee chairs, and other Members of the 
     committee. Indeed, upon initially assuming the chair of the 
     Post Office and Civil Service Committee, such consultations 
     were not simply desirable, they were essential. Requiring the 
     establishment of an oversight agenda very early in the first 
     session of a Congress unduly limits the ability of Members to 
     assess the needs of our constituents and may effectively 
     require the committee chair to establish the agenda 
     arbitrarily before he or she has had an opportunity to 
     consult with committee Members. The Joint Committee has 
     suggested that the committees may request the assistance 
     of CRS and GAO in developing their agendas. While I have 
     found that those organizations can be very helpful, I do 
     not feel they constitute an appropriate substitute for 
     input from committee Members.
       The Joint Committee recommendation apparently contemplates 
     that the House Administration Committee, in conjunction with 
     the Committee on Government Operations, will act to 
     coordinate the various oversight agendas submitted to it, the 
     purpose being to eliminate duplicative hearings. I disagree 
     with the Joint Committee's view regarding the inefficacy of 
     ``redundant'' hearings. Numerous committees have held 
     hearings on the subject of health care reform in this 
     Congress. In my view, the ability of a broad range of Members 
     to participate in the hearing process has promoted 
     Congressional understanding of this vital issue. I also have 
     serious concerns about the extent to which the House 
     Administration and Government Operations Committees would 
     coordinate oversight agendas.
       The Joint Committee recommends that committees be required 
     to hold oversight hearings on reports issued by inspectors 
     general, GAO, and others. According to the Joint Committee, 
     ``Requiring the committees of jurisdiction to conduct 
     hearings on appropriate reports issued during the preceding 
     Congress by, for example, the GAO or the inspectors general 
     will help assure that Members and the public are made aware 
     of management issues and recommendations for corrective 
     action.'' I am unaware of any committee that does not hold 
     hearings on ``appropriate'' reports by GAO and others, 
     normally in the same Congress that the report is issued. It 
     would appear that the Joint Committee is dissatisfied with 
     the ability of committees to establish their own oversight 
     agendas and is seeking to transfer that responsibility to 
     others. If this is the Joint Committee's position, I strongly 
     disagree with the assessment and the proposed solution.
       Finally, the Joint Committee recommends that the Speaker 
     appoint a task force to issue recommendations on achieving 
     savings in the cost of the legislative branch consistent with 
     the reductions implemented by the executive branch under the 
     National Performance Review. The National Performance Review 
     recommended a reduction of 252,000 Federal employees by the 
     end of 1999. As Chairman of the Committee on Post Office and 
     Civil Service, I have endeavored to ascertain the basis for 
     this recommendation. As nearly as I can tell, the 
     recommendation to reduce the Federal workforce by 252,000 
     employees was based solely on a desire to project a workforce 
     figure below 2,000,000 by the end of fiscal year 1999. To the 
     extent that the executive branch is undergoing retrenchment, 
     the Congress, as a matter of political necessity, will have 
     to undertake similar steps. It is my hope, however, that such 
     reductions would be based upon a realistic assessment of the 
     needs of the institution. There is no basis for assuming that 
     an arbitrary 12 percent staff reduction is appropriate in 
     either the legislative or executive branch.
       I sincerely appreciate the opportunity to express my views 
     on these matters.

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